


something bigger in the dark

by capra



Category: Figure Skating RPF
Genre: Asthma, Blood and Torture, M/M, Night Terrors, Nightmares, Nobody Actually Dies, Panic Attacks, everything's okay at the end, i feel bad for giving him such a bad frighten
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2020-06-26 16:04:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19771687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/capra/pseuds/capra
Summary: Yuzuru has a nightmare.





	something bigger in the dark

**Author's Note:**

  * For [K1mHeechu1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/K1mHeechu1/gifts).



> Contains potentially triggering graphic depiction of blood, knifework, and surrealist torture/horror. Please proceed with awareness of your own limits.
> 
> Also, I'm not a medical professional, so please don't use anything in this as advice, whether to help or harm.
> 
> This work of fiction is based on cherry-picked qualities of personality culled from the publicly available data and performed personas of public figures who may or may not, with heavy emphasis of probability on not, be in truth anything at all like they are shown here. In short, it is *fiction.*
> 
> *

_strike a match_

_i'm gonna strike a match_

_watch me strike a match_

_and burn it down_  
  
-Strike A Match, Zayde Wølf

*

yuzuru is squirming, trying to gain purchase on the slick floor, trying to reach javier. it's too late, his hindbrain knows it, but his conscious mind won't accept that. accepting that is accepting that there's nothing he can do, that what he's about to see is inevitable. and somehow, that feels worse than the effort to reach a goal he knows is impossible, knows is out of his reach. somehow, it feels like accepting that he's about to watch javier die - that he won't be able to stop it from happening - is worse than telling himself that he can stop it if he just tries hard enough, if he pushes harder, wrenches his legs free, _manages_ somehow.  
  
if - when - he fails, then at least he'll have someone to blame. instead of nothing.

but that is his future. as yet, that is all amorphous not-even-thought, faintly wisping through his mind like an aroma in the front of his skull, just one small part of the fog that overwhelms him.

right now, his present moment is this: slick and frictionless surface, made moreso by the blood that coats it. frictionless means ice, means rinks, and maybe that's where they are right now; he can't think beyond the immediate moment, javier torqued unnaturally under the hulking, dark-clad shape that looms over him like a wolf over its prey. no, it's a hyena - hyenas cackle, mocking the dead meat twitching out its final breaths beneath them, and this attacker is laughing, too, delighted by his strength, his monstrous power.  
  
right now, his present moment is rubber-soled sneakers slipping, failing to grip, failing to give him the momentum he needs. right now, his hands are sliced bloody across the fingertips and palms, but the slices come from digging his nails into the grooves and craters left in the ice by blades, and those are the only things that are giving him any reliable purchase, allowing him any progress. so he doesn't mind _that_ blood.

right now, he's pulling himself forward on his belly, dragging his body like deadweight across the ice, clawing his way toward javier. every meter is a struggle. through years of work he's shaped his body to propel with his legs, to gain torque with his core and thighs and back. never in his career has his upper body strength mattered so much to him as it does right now, as it fails to be enough. as _**he**_ fails to be enough.

centimeter by centimeter, he claws at the ice, pushes with the toes of his sneakers. he aches for his toepicks, for his gloves, for anything. anything that would get him there faster. in time. time seems to be swaying, moving irregularly. if that's so, then maybe there _is_ time. maybe he _can_ make it, if he pushes harder, tries harder. his ankle gives out, so he pushes twice as hard with his left leg, pulls thrice as hard with his arms, dragging his body forward.

the form looms over javier, who's laying on his left side, twisted half around. his right shoulder arches back, skimming the ice, and he looks up over his shoulder, twisting his neck and spine to put yuzuru in his view. his legs are pinned, and though they're mostly blocked from view by the form's hunkered-down bulk and javier's own shoulders, there's a patch of red ice in the background that really can only have one source. there was a crack, a snap-crackle-popping of bones and sinew, yuzuru remembers now. why doesn't he remember seeing it happen? but now he remembers the noise, and now he can see that the soles of javier's feet are facing him. human knees and legs don't bend like that.

yuzuru sucks in air, meaning to expel it in a scream. if he yells loudly enough, he can scare away the form. he's sure he can. he draws in air, inhales until his lungs feel like they'll burst, and opens his mouth. the air stops in his throat, and suddenly he can't breathe. he can't exhale, and can't inhale. his throat spasms, gagging on nothing, and he lurches forward, curling onto his side. one hand claws the ice and the other claws his own throat, as if there's a physical blockage that he can pull out like a cork. there isn't, and the clutching gulping panic in his throat only grows. a thickness begins to form, or seems to, on his tongue; he coughs, trying to expel it, and only succeeds in making his throat close even tighter, dry walls of flesh gummed together to suffocate him.

his inhaler might help, but it is nowhere. the same nowhere that has taken his boots, his gloves, his Pooh; everything but himself, in his street clothes and sneakers and blood streaking his pale throat and hands, crushed to the ice by the force of the assailant attacking javier. nothing is touching him but the ice and the air that refuses his lungs, that won't let him breathe even enough for the necessary effort to claw his way toward javier as he dies.  
  
because that's what's happening, he realizes. he was too late to start with, but also, nothing about this is playing fair. the assailant is holding yuzuru flattened and helpless with barely a thought, without even a glance. in his hulking, black-muscled form, silver knives flashing in his hands, he crouches over javier and takes his time. one piece at a time, he's cutting into javier, shaving him away strip by strip like a spitted roast, nothing but meat to be portioned away. yuzuru knows that javier's losing blood, muscle, life, with every cut. the fact that he can't see it happening, that javier's twisted, wrenched form is still fully clothed, still fully intact, doesn't change that fact.  
  
this man-beast over him is destroying him, yuzuru is _certain_ of this, and even if the pieces he's taking from him are invisible, intangible, they're still real. the lake of blood spreading around his body, freezing to the ice like a macabre tie-dye, is proof.   
  
the hyena-man cackles again, rearing back, and yuzuru can see for the first time that he's tall, and thinner than he appeared at first. in addition to the knives in his hands he bears knives at his elbows, knees, ankles; there are blades on his toes, blades on his fingertips. blades rise from each vertebra in his curved spine. when his dark mouth opens, silver-black blades gleam where teeth should be. beneath him, javier twists, moaning in pain. he grabs at the ice, weakly trying to drag himself away, but the man simply sinks to one knee, driving the blade attached there through javier's calf and into the ice.  
  
javier sobs in pain, spasming, and curls up in a ball.

yuzuru knows this is a mistake as soon as he sees it happen. javier's left his back unguarded, his nape bare. again yuzuru tries to pull in air, tries to scream a warning, but no air will come, and his chest seizes, lungs collapsing upon themselves. his vision flickers, blackened around the edges, and he feels the tears on his cheek beginning to freeze to the ice. somehow, though, javier hears, or senses, yuzuru's silent scream. he lifts his head and, even as each motion clearly pains him, tips his head back, trying to find yuzuru. he's disoriented, gaze gone glassy, and though he's looking straight at yuzuru, he can't see him. his gaze drifts, flicking side to side, desperate and unmoored.  
  
javier's nape is still exposed, still bare, and yuzuru knows somehow what's about to happen. he knows, but he's helpless to stop it, frozen in place by his tears and blood, crystallized into the ice he lies on like tiny chains. for the first time since this began, he thinks that if he wanted to, he could close his eyes. that he could deny this, deny what's about to happen. if he doesn't watch it, maybe it won't be real. maybe it won't happen.  
  
he keeps his eyes open anyway. 

the beastly man crouches low over javier. he is crooning, a half-clicking half-sussurant noise that stands all the hair on yuzuru's nape on end. he lowers his hand and drops his knife. it clatters to the ice, but the five blades on his fingertips gleam. he curls his hand, fingers held together, into a shallow cup, and with this he encircles the nape of javier's neck and the back of his skull.  
  
if he could breathe, yuzuru would throw up to see that tender gesture, that movement of trust and support, perverted by this monster in this way.  
  
javier, still unseeing, twists to try to get away, feeling the familiar touch but knowing that it's wrong. the hand holds still, and yuzuru's mind whites out as he watches javier struggle, blindly unaware of the blades cradled so close to his spine, his jugular, his trachea.

somehow, a miracle happens, and javier exhausts himself, falling limp against the ice, with his neck unscathed. yuzuru sobs, the first noise he's successfully made, and the squeaking, whining noise of it draws the attention of both the monster and javier.  
  
"yusu?"  
  
yuzuru expected that javier's voice would be wrenched, dry and hoarse and pained, but it's not; his warm, summery sunshine-honey tone shapes those two syllables perfectly, lilting upward at the end, hopeful. he's holding his fear back, smothering it behind his faith and hope. the impossibility of that, the _improbability_ of it in this situation, is so perfectly javier that yuzuru feels like his heart could break. but then the hyena beast man cackles, soft, _fond_ , and its mouth splits open in a shiny grin.  
  
_**"** **i'm right here, habi,** **"**_ it says, and closes its fist of razors around his neck.  
  


  
  
  
_The night is gettin' colder under city lights_

_Lonely souls, they stagger like they've all gone blind_

_There is something bigger in the dark tonight_

  
*

Yuzu bolts upright in bed with a shriek that rips at the tender tissues of his throat and has him immediately hacking for air, wheezing through his sobs. His lungs close, flattening like crushed origami, and his vision flashes black and neon as the effects of oxygen deprivation kick in twice as fast for his body that's been breathing shallowly in sleep, that's seizing up in fear and panic.  
  
"Yusuru!" Hands on his back, hands at his throat, pulling him against a solid, hard body that's warm, that's alive and whole, that contains a heart racing fast and strong and loud. "Yusu, Yusu, you're not breathing."  
  
Hands, pressing a small, hard, angled device into his hands. Then, pulling it away, as his fingers twitch uselessly, hands and forearms shaking with tremors. A hard plastic edge is pressed to his lips, forced between them. A puff of bitter chemical fills his mouth, coating his soft palate. Another puff makes it further back, hitting the top of his throat. His head is pushed back, chin tipped up. Fingers in his mouth hold his tongue down and a warm voice like summer honey is endless in his ear, syllables in liquid, a fast-flowing sequence of prayer.  
  
Time stops mattering.  
  
When Yuzu comes back to himself, it's not immediately clear how long it took him. Sitting upright in his bed, legs crossed, he assesses his situation piece by piece. His legs are crossed right over left, where he usually crosses them left over right, and his skin is clammy with sweat from his brow to his belly. His heart is stumbling in his chest, unsteady but heavy, and his head *aches* with the particularly sharp pain that means he's just escaped a particularly bad attack.  
  
Yuzu tips to his left, instinctively following the radiant warmth he feels there, and hears a soft, broken gasp of relief. Javier's fingers recede from his mouth, and Yuzu closes his jaw, rolling it to flex against the ache. His head thumps against Javier's chest, and Javier's arms close around him, one around his shoulders and one around his head, boxing out the world. Yuzu closes his eyes, shuddering, and the first sob of what will be many drips weakly from his lips.

It's many minutes more before the crying fit, which begun with weak, wrung-out sobs and ends with soft, pathetic whimpers, lets him go. Above him, Javier is still murmuring fervent words of prayer.  
  
"What...happened?"  
  
Javier kisses his brow, pushing sweaty hair back from his temples. Yuzu can feel the tremor in Javier's shoulders, the tension that he still won't release, not until he's _sure_ Yuzu is out of the woods.  
  
"Nightmare, I think. You woke up screaming, and I think the panic attack hit at the same moment that the asthma attack did."  
  
"I don't remember anything," Yuzu mutters, wedging his face tighter against the crook of dark and warm space between Javi's chest and the hard curves of his bicep. "There was so much blood."  
  
"Was it an injury again?"  
  
"No," Yuzu says quickly, and Javier hums to soothe him, to quiet his urgency.  
  
"Shhh. Mi vida, you don't have to tell me."  
  
"I feel like I do," Yuzu says, hiccuping through the first spasms of another crying fit. "It- it was about you. I don't remember, I just-- I just know you were--"  
  
"I'm here with you, Yusu," Javier murmurs. "I'm right here."  
  
Yuzu's eyes fly wide in the dark of the bedroom. "N-no, no, don't--"  
  
Javi's grip on Yuzu's shoulder tightens. "Hey. Hey, shh. It's okay, mi vida, cariño, I'm okay."  
  
"Say- say it again," Yuzu sobs.  
  
"I'm right here?" Javi tries, but Yuzu shakes his head against Javi's chest, burrowing deeper. He doesn't know why, but those words aren't good, aren't helping right now.  
  
Javi clicks his tongue, attentive, hearing what Yuzu isn't saying. "Okay. None of that. Then, I'm okay. Is that helping? I'm okay, Yusu, I'm okay. I'm safe with you. I'm okay."  
  
Yuzu shakes, clinging to Javier, and listens until the sky lightens, and the darkness shrinks away.

*

**Author's Note:**

> This is a bit outside my normal oeuvre but I hope you liked it anyway!
> 
> This past few months has been extremely taxing for me on a personal level. When a friend asked for some wholesome torture and fic murder, I think I exorcised my demons, as well as (hopefully) hers, by writing this.
> 
> For everyone waiting for updates on Two Crosses: You will be very happy with my next upload. Thank you for your patience.
> 
> For everyone: I'm @caprafic on Twitter. Thank you for reading. <3


End file.
